FRIDAY - Parlovr are from Montreal. And on Friday night, it was pretty easy to tell that they were from Montreal. They took to the stage at the Silver Dollar at 11 o'clock, after a blistering set by one of Toronto's catchiest retro indie rock outfits, Hooded Fang. And Parlovr, like many of the bands visiting the festival from la belle ville, had red squares pinned to their chests — the symbol of solidarity with the student protest movement sweeping Quebec.

But even without the squares, you might have been able to guess when they came from. Montreal does, after all, have a habit of producing bands this good. By the time they went on, the room was packed with people excited to see the three-piece, as many bodies as possible crammed into the small, awkward space between the front of the stage and the long bar. The air was thick with sweat and the humid summer, smoke machine smoke lit up with lights of blue and pink and green. And when they let loose with guitars and drums, keyboards and distortion, the crowd throbbed and shouted along to music that always loud and driving, never quite settling into any one genre, not simply indie or alternative or Radio 3-friendly, but maybe best described as just plain really good rock 'n' roll.